Menu

Airbnb Now Allows Guests to Pay Less Up Front

Airbnb has recently announced a new feature that will help guests manage their payments on the platform. This new feature, named as “Pay Less Up Front”, will allow users pay for a part of their trip upon booking & the rest closer to the check-in day. Earlier, guests had to pay for the whole trip while they booked the reservation.

For qualifying for “Pay Less Up Front,” it is important for guests to book at least 14 days before the check-in date. Also, guests needs to spend atleast $250 for the entire stay.

“We understand it can be difficult to pay for all of your holiday upfront, especially in January when the purse-strings have to be held particularly tight. That’s why we’ve introduced our new feature which allows you to get holidays booked in advance – to make sure you don’t lose out when it comes to annual leave – then make the main payment for your holiday closer to your actual trip,” said Airbnb.

The new payment option is available on Android, iOS, mobile web as well as desktop.

Airbnb tested this new feature with select users 8 found that around 40 percent of users opted to pay less up front. The company also found that the feature led to more bookings further in advance.

While it is true that hosts will get less money up front, the company positioned this new initiative as an advantage for hosts “who won’t lose out on bookings from cash-flow-sensitive guests.”

This is not the first new payment related feature that Airbnb has introduced recently. Last year in November, Airbnb also launched split payments feature for group travel. This feature enables organizers to pay their share & hold the reservation for upto 72 hours, giving time to other group members log on to Airbnb as well as pay their portion.

These new features are part of Airbnb’s larger efforts to attract more and more users. Airbnb has also made a push to better serve travelers who are disabled. Last year, the company acquired startup Accomable for helping travelers with disabilities find more accessible-friendly rental options.